Sunil Joshi,eccentric of Dewas,man with a temper & lots of clout

Joshi,who died in his late 30s,drove a Bolero,ran a fledgling courier shop in Indore and even lent money to his aides.

Sunil Joshi,the murdered RSS pracharak whose name has come up in connection with the alleged Hindu terror network,was known to everyone locally as a man with a temper and lots of clout. He made some enemies but he had friends too,evident from the numbers who took to the streets after he was murdered on December 29,2007.

Joshi,who died in his late 30s,drove a Bolero,ran a fledgling courier shop in Indore and even lent money to his aides. He had so much clout that he had a say in appointments to local government bodies.

Joshi had fled to Gujarat after the 2003 murders of Congress leader Pyare Singh Ninama and his son but returned to MP after the Congress was unseated by the BJP late in 2003. From then,he went about his work without problems. The only thing that had changed was that he now had a flowing beard.

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Joshi had four close aides,who have disappeared since his death,and they were frequently seen at local shops and even found odd jobs. He had a one-room house in Chuna Khadan at the end of a lane opening to a highway; he allegedly used it to shelter a suspect in the Best Bakery blast.

The day he was murdered,he was to about to start dinner when he was called on the phone,allegedly by his aides. Because his two-wheeler had a puncture,he walked to Chuna Khadan and was killed.

Joshis niece Chanchal,19,misses her uncle and the clout her family wielded. I saw him in a local BJP leaders home few days before his murder, said one of Joshis friends,who studied with him in Saraswati Shishu Mandir in Jawahar Chowk till the early 1980s.

He was eccentric and hyperactive. He started attending an RSS shakha when he was in the fifth standard, the friend said. He recalled how stunned he had been at a paan shop when he saw Joshi for the first time since their schooldays. It took me a while because of the beard but I recognised him. I later met him at a BJP leaders house and he was working without problems.

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A few days before his murder,Joshi had a fight with the chairman of a local government body and threatened him,If I could appoint you I can also ensure that you are removed. The chairman had been questioned by the police in connection with the Ninama murder.

The twin murders had followed the alleged humiliation of Joshis friend Dharmendra Pandhya,whose locks had been cut off by the Congress leader. He was religious and a fanatic but we never knew about his involvement in acts of terror, said an uncle of his,a lawyer,who also dismissed the police theory that he was killed because he had not behaved with his accomplices.

He alleged that local photographer Vasudev Parmar had been framed by the police. Why would he attend to Joshis mother if he was the killer?

He was full of negative thoughts, said a neighbour who often met Joshi.

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The chargesheet filed by the Rajasthan police mention Joshis visit in 2007 to Ujjain where he performed pinddaan,a Hindu ritual,for victims of Islamic terror. The local police did not probe his murder and were about to file a closure report when the Rajasthan ATS made arrests in the Ajmer blast case,leading to the reopening of the murder case.